About the Plan & Process
What is a comprehensive plan?
A comprehensive plan is a 10-year strategic land use plan for a municipality. The comprehensive planning process consists of public engagement, data collection and data analysis, a vision statement, as well as goals, objectives, and strategies for various topic areas. Topic areas in a comprehensive plan include: Future Land Use, Housing, Mobility and Transportation, Economy, Natural Resources, Historic and Cultural Resources, Public Facilities, Fiscal Capacity, Climate Solutions and more. Comprehensive Plans provide high-level guidance and a framework for future projects and decision-making.
Why does a comprehensive plan matter?
Why is the Town of Mount Desert doing one? Comprehensive plans are opportunities to celebrate a community; to reflect on how a community may be changing, what the community values, and plan for how those values take shape in the future. Comprehensive plans validate municipal zoning and land use ordinances — zoning and land use ordinances must align with the comprehensive plan, future land use plan section, and designated growth areas (if applicable). Existing comprehensive plans should be updated every 10 years by the State of Maine. There are many grants and funding opportunities that require applicants to demonstrate how proposed projects are in line with a municipality’s current comprehensive plan. Comprehensive plans are also platforms for big ideas and future additional studies or smaller-scale plans.
What is the Comprehensive Planning Committee?
The Town of Mount Desert Comprehensive Planning Committee is a town committee tasked with developing a new comprehensive plan every ten years and monitoring the implementation of the policy recommendations in the current plan. Comprehensive Planning Committee meetings are open to the public and via Zoom. The schedule is currently being determined.
The Town of Mount Desert Comprehensive Plan Committee consists of:
Katrina Carter, Member
Judy Gilkes Benson, Member
Heather Jones, Member, Committee Chair
Stephanie Kelley Reece, Member
Howard Lawrence, Member
Wendy Littlefield, Selectboard/Ex Officio
Tracy Loftus Keller, Member
Gail Marshall, LUZO Advisory Group/Member
Kathleen Miller, Member
Shoshona Smith, Member
Noel Musson and Susanne Paul, Consultants
The Musson Group
How do I find out more information or get involved?
There will be many ways to participate in the Town of Mount Desert Comprehensive Plan! Take the survey; attend a comprehensive planning committee meeting to learn more; participate in a public workshop; provide comments on plan drafts as they become available; and attend a public open house or public hearing. The public is also welcome to submit ideas or comments to the town at any time.
Fill out the form below or email compplan@mtdesert.org with questions.
Recent Planning Efforts
2009 Town of Mount Desert Comprehensive Plan
The existing Town of Mount Desert Comprehensive Plan was approved and adopted by the town in 2009. Click here to see the existing plan.
In the late fall and winter of 2022-3 Town of Mount Desert hosted a series of Village Planning Workshops to gather planning and public services input from individual villages. Click here to read the report.
Village Planning Workshops
The Town of Mount Desert partnered with A Climate to Thrive in 2021 to create a Climate Action Plan with funding from the Maine Governor’s Office of Policy, Innovation and the Future. Click here to read the report.
Climate Action Plan
Fall - Winter 2024
Data collection and analysis
Winter & Spring 2025
Survey
Review Key Findings
Community Engagement
Summer 2025
Vision and Values
Drafting Goals
Community Engagement
Fall 2025
Future Land Use Planning
Drafting Action Items
Community Engagement
Fall - Winter 2025
Full Plan drafting
Community Engagement
Approximate Timeline
Get in touch!
Please fill out this form with any questions or to get more information about the Town of Mount Desert comprehensive planning process. You can also email compplan@mtdesert.org.